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Get a Haynes manual. Professional mechanics get in trouble with these things. For example, the two belts have to be installed with the timing marks 180 degrees out of phase. The timing marks for belts are not the same as timing marks for ignition.

The job is not hard, it take me about 4 hours and I reseal the oil pump and replace the cam seals and O rings.

Don't get a haynes for timing belts.. get an FSM or someone that knows how to do it to help you. The haynes manual I have doesn't show the correct procedure for installing the belts. it left a step out.

the haynes book describes the right procedure, but the pics assume you have turned the crank 360 deg. if you go by the pics alone it will throw you off. if you read the text then the pics will make sense!

The frist time I changed belts in my 88 EA82, I followed the instr in the Haynes manual. I got covers back on, then decided to test run before I went further. Found I had one head off 1/2 turn on the crank. (I did the 360 rotate as specified.) Bout a year later, neighborr pulled in with an XT he got at an auction. Toook awahile to realilize what was happening, but again, found one cam off 1/2 turn. Last year, my boy bought an XT. drove it a few months and a belt went out. Knowing about the difficulties following the Haynes manual, I put in the belts, test run only to find out I had that one wrong.

Summary, I put 2 in wrong, even knowing better the second time (but still trying to interpret the Hanyse manual). One other pull in the drive that someone else also got wrong.

Should not hurt anything if you get one cam off 1/2 turn, but it will run terrible. Test run before putting everything back on that you would have to remove IF you got it wrong.

I still think the "rotate crank shaft 360o" is a crock!. There's no reason to do this. Just put both cams in THE RIGHT PLACE to begin with and be done with it.

I did not install the engine myself - I payed a shade tree mechanic $200 to do it, plus parts like timing belts.
They were new and lasted 2 months. He put a new (second) set 2 days ago - and it drove for an hour. Same thing for second time. Had to walk to a pay phone for miles. In retrospect, I wish I had done the whole thing myself even though it would have taken me longer.

Anyway, I am really frustrated. Is there a web page or something which is explicit about timing belts. He obviously doesn't know how to install them if I experienced 2 failures and I know even less than that.

I had one of my wagons eat a couple timing belts due to idler spocket bearing failing. It would momentarily hault rotation and in turn, rip off a series of belt teeth. As I remember it, the Sube dealer wanted >$100 bux for a new idler. One afternoon at work, I had just put new bearings in a 1/2-3/4 hp electric motor and was looking at the old bearing. It was the same thing that was in the idler sprocket. Don't quote me on this, but I believe it's astandard 6203 bearing. Not too big of a deal to press in either. Cost? About 5 bux.

It seems that I do remember timing marks in the 6:00 position on one or both heads timing cases. What is it, RH (as looking at front of engine) goes to the 12:00 and LH goes to 6:00 position with out the 360o rotation? Or is it both go to 12:00?

"Subaru. Inexpensive and built to stay that way!" (As long as you don't have to got to the dealer. I'm sure that was in the fine print somewhere.)

I just changed the belts on one of my RX's and the crank gear were installed wrong. There are two gears and they should both have the flange towards the back of the engine. Mine had one flange towards the rear and one towards the front. The belts were rubbing together. There was a considerably loss of belt material and a huge mess inside the timing covers but no breakage.

XSNRG, Unless that year EA82 is different, then I would have to disagree with you. I am looking at the FSM for 1987 and it states if both the timing belts and head gasket are new then it should have 33-55 lbs but if it is other than above it should be 24-46 lbs. This is for belt tension. Straight out of the book. Boz

The numbers you give are correct for belt tension but not for torque spec.

The spec I quoted is the torque you set the torque wrench to and then using that torque wrench hooked to the cam sprocket spanner, you would apply that torque to the cam spocket pulling the belt to that torque and then tighten the tensioner bolts. After doing this you could then use a belt tension measuring tool (I don't have one of these) to verify that the torque wrench applied the correct tension. If the mech that did his car used those tension specs for torque, I think this would more than likely cause the belts to break, soon, not to mention possibly damage to cam bearing, tensioners and the idler (although probably not, IMO, due to the short time it ran).

Boz, I think you may have solved the mystery!

I'll quote both these torque specs for those interested.

When both timing belt and head gasket are new, torque to cam sprocket=17-19 ft lb

I looked at my previous post and I wrote tension:banghead: DUH, sorry about that, definately did not mean belt tension, was talking about the tension created by torqueing the cam pulley. I can see how that post served no useful purpose:dead: